draft 0082 – who was the greatest man in history? (Prophet Muhammad ﷺ), according to Michael H. Hart

As I mentioned in my draft last week (draft 0079, the prophetic diet) that I would talk about Michael H. Hart’s book The 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential Persons in History. I will be doing that now. 

Talking about the 100 most influential man in history and Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) was right at the top. We should all read that work including me. 

In the book Michael H. Hart makes a list of the 100 most influential people in history. So, I will just give you the top 10, for context.

1. Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him): ranked first because of his meaningful success in both the religious and secular realms.
2. Isaac Newton: second because of his monumental contributions to physics and mathematics.
3. Jesus Christ (peace be upon him): third because of his role as the central figure of Christianity.
4. Buddha: fourth because of his profound impact on Buddhism, that reshaped the spiritual landscapes of Asia.
5. Confucius: fifth because of his philosophy that formed the the foundations of Chinese governance, education and social structure for more than 2,000 years.
6. Paul the Apostle: sixth because of his role of being the true architect and principal exporter of Christianity.
7. Cai Lun: seventh because of his invention of paper, which Hart said without paper the widespread transmissions, recordings and preservation of human knowledge would have been impossible.
8. Johann Gutenberg: eighth because of his invention of the movable-type printing press in Europe. As it democratised information, supercharged the renaissance and the scientific revolution and allowed all these ideas of all other historical figures to be spread quickly and widely.
9. Christopher Columbus: ninth because of his voyages that that permanently connected the Old World and the New World. This contact started the huge shifts of of European colonisation , the modern global economy and the reshaping of the entire western hemisphere (which I’m not sure all this is a good thing, but yet again most influential, so they don’t have to have done good things).
10. Albert Einstein: tenth because of his theories of relativity completely turned upside down Newtonian physics, and revolutionised our understanding of space, time and gravity. Also, his work created the way for nuclear physics and the atomic age (I’m not sure he wanted that one to happen, Oppenheimer’s fault).

So, here we are. The top 10 most influential people in history by Michael H. Hart. And who did he put at number one, Prophet Muhammad) peace be upon them). Now, we have to remember that Michael H. Hart was a Christian and he would have loved to put Jesus Christ (peace be upon them) at number one. But he couldn’t because Jesus Christ (peace be upon them) didn’t meet the criteria’s they had come up with to rank the most influential people in history. 

The is a video of Sheikh Khalid Yasin talking about Michael H. Hart and what he said about Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon them). If you want to watch it here is the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6IqxqwxwAqE

Finally, if you are interested in reading his book about Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon them), here is the name of the book: The 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential Persons in History by Michael H. Hart. 

So, I’ll be back on Friday evening at 10pm.

See you then, drafters. 

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Here’s the link: https://untitleddraftsredrafted.substack.com